


what comes afterwards

by velvetgunfire



Series: AU Merry Christmas (present-fics) [2]
Category: w-inds. (Band)
Genre: AU, M/M, sensitive content untagged due to spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-12-31
Updated: 2006-12-31
Packaged: 2019-04-28 02:18:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14439360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/velvetgunfire/pseuds/velvetgunfire
Summary: "Now close your eyes and imagine it," Keita says, and they both do.





	what comes afterwards

Keita folds Ryuichi's hand in his, and Ryuichi smiles at him, setting a palm over their hands closed together. They're settled on the sofa in Keita's living-room, and the TV is on and blaring some post-christmas sort-of-new-year special variety shows that used to annoy him even while it depressed him but which he now regards as background noise.  
  
Ryuichi settles into his life, just like that. His stuff fills up the corners and the cupboards and bookshelves and the shoe-rack, and his guitar (acoustic) lies propped by the sofa where he can grab it at a moments notice and the other (electric) is plugged into the amp and sits in Keita's home recording studio where Keita composes and arranges for other bands, the way others like Hayama-san once did for them.  
  
This time around it's different. Ryuichi insists on grabbing his hand when they're out in public, and Keita tries to convince him that he shouldn't do it for the sake of his career (his band is taking off), but Ryuichi's stubborn. So they do. And speaking of Ryuichi's band, which Keita sees often on magazine covers these days -- the other members are all unique, all charming, and Keita can't help but feel a tinge of envy and a little bit of fear as he traces his finger over Ryuichi's smile, wide, the other four boys all crowded about him.   
  
Surely, Keita thinks, Ryuichi's the center of the group, the sun that's drawn all of them into his orbit. That's how it used to go, anyway.   
  
One day Keita comes home, and almost all the lights are off, save for the one that hangs over the dining-table, and Ryuichi's there, face obscured by his fringe as he bends over a magazine. Keita draws nearer, and sees its one of those old ones he keeps in stacks, and this issue -- this is one several months after he --   
  
Ryuichi looks up as Keita draws nearer, then his head dips again, unwilling gaze drawn to Keita and Ryohei, standing there under the Spring sun, forever eighteen. He draws the pad of his thumb over their faces. "Why's there no more of you two, after this issue?"   
  
"We just -- couldn't." Keita can't explain it, the words spin themselves out into nothingness and fall short of meaning.   
  
"I should have been there," Ryuichi says, sadly, and Keita sees a glimmer of tears in those eyes before a fat droplet rolls down his cheek and splashes onto the yellowed (but still slightly glossy) paper of the magazine. "I'm sorry."  
  
"I'm sorry," Keita murmurs in return, because he doesn't know what to say, and he gathers Ryuichi in his arms, kisses the velvet softness of his cheek, Ryuichi who's all gangly limbs and growing adolescent, life and vigour and his heartbeat  _oh_  so --   
  
"I thought we'd have a stupid party, both of us, when we turned twenty, you know," Ryuichi hiccups, "and drink ourselves stupid just because we finally  _could_  and run around making fools of ourselves and and and -- " He makes a face and wipes his eyes. Keita rubs his back.   
  
"It would have been fun," Keita says. He gently smoothes Ryuichi's eyes shut with his fingertips. "Now close your eyes and imagine it," Keita says, and they both do. "The clink of bottles in the plastic bag of the conbini. That keeps startling us because we're trying to sneak them in."  
  
"Mmm. The popping of the caps as we wrench open the bottles."  
  
"The creak of the bedsprings because we're jumping on them. The slosh of the beer."  
  
"The sound of the doorknob -- "  
  
"And the disapproving face of -- "  
  
" -- Ryohei, before we -- "  
  
" ambush him and -- "  
  
Ryuichi bursts out laughing, and his eyes flash open, glinting wetly, and Keita cradles him and he slides his arms about Keita's neck and they're laughing, laughing, and then they're kissing.  
  
Ryuichi's all sleek muscle over angled limbs, smooth unlined skin and the expression in his eyes just the same. It's different now. Keita can see the innocence in his eyes, where before he was too preoccupied with noticing the darkness. Which still lies alongside it, like a sleeping panther. He grazes the pad of his thumb over Ryuichi's cheek.   
  
Ryuichi answers his unspoken question. "It hurt, you know. I won't lie and say it didn't."   
  
It's changed him in some way, this place which Ryuichi has gone to and returned from, but he's still the same old Ryuichi, in that his smile for Keita has never changed.   
  
Keita pushes Ryuichi's shirt up, over planes of muscle and bone, the arc of his ribs and the rapid flutter of his breathing, and Ryuichi looks up at him with perfect trust.   
  
"I'll take care of you," Keita says. Ryuichi's eyes are the bright places which he falls into.


End file.
